Education policies for migrant schoolchildren in Moscow Region (2010-2015): Lessons from the Californian experience on migrant schoolchildren integration
Characteristics of legislation for migrant students in the United States and Russia. Conducting a study of intercultural education for all dimensions. The peculiarity of the state policy in the interests of immigrant pupils in Moscow and California.
| Рубрика | Иностранные языки и языкознание |
| Вид | магистерская работа |
| Язык | английский |
| Дата добавления | 30.08.2016 |
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As for the Blacks, these graduates were of more socio-cultural capitals. After all the estimations and comparisons of various forms of capital, the opportunity for Blacks to enroll a college was higher than for Whites and Hispanics.
G. Kao held another research in the USA. The description can be found in the article “Educational achievement of immigrant adolescents in Spain: do gender and region of origin matter?” written in 2012 (Vaquera & Kao, 2012). Main research question is “To what extent are theories of assimilation proposed by American scholars relevant for immigrants currently attending Spanish schools?” Authors are linear estimation techniques. There is a gap in educational outcomes between two groups of migrants, women and men. This gape is analyzed among third generation of migrants in comparison with other generations. For instance, third generation women are much better in studying languages and Maths. However, this difference is not related to men. In consequence of this fact, the third generation of migrants are more assimilated to the new environment. So, the positive trend can be proved. As for other results, one of the most influential factors that affect academic achievements of migrants are social environment, friends' attitude to the studying and general class climate.
The research was built on two stages. First one was about comparison of educational achievements of rural pupils and urban ones. In the first step, simple comparison of test scores was conducted. After this step, they descriptively explore the differences in academic performance of migrants and locals in public schools in the rural areas (Shaanxi) and urban areas (Beijing). The second step included multivariate regression analysis to examine the rural/urban-migrant student academic achievement gap and seek to identify the determinants/correlates of this gap. Finally, they came to the following conclusions. According to the data, migrants from private schools study better than migrant students in migrant schools. According to the empirical analysis, access to the urban public schooling system might be a solution to the substandard educational quality of the migrant students. Had school resources and teacher quality been equal between the migrant and rural schools, migrant students would have outperformed rural students by an even greater margin than what we have observed in our data (Lai et al., 2014a) (Lai et al., 2014b). As for dependent variable, they used educational outcomes. Independent variables are immigrant origin (background), region, gender, school climate, and cultural capital.
In the article “Academic trajectories of newcomer immigrant youth”, Suбrez-Orozco C., Gaytбn F.X., Bang Hee Jin, Pakes J. O'Connor E., Rhodes J. studied “What is the influence of migrant background on academic performance of migrant young newcomers?”(Suбrez-Orozco et al., 2010). They used multinomial logistic regression, latent growth modeling to understand the correlation. This research analyzed the significant effect of social capital and interactions with school environments. For newcomer immigrant youth, positive relationships with family, community, and school members relate to their well-being and to their performance at school. The migrants did not have a possibility to use various programs and services, which were available for locals. These educational features included mentoring, after-schooling, class organizations.
The results showed that if there is a poor social environment in school, it affects negatively the educational achievements of migrant pupils. There are no working adaptation mechanisms, which should exist in educational systems. Authors insist on the fact that if there were mechanisms such as academic supports of migrants, after-schooling activities, providing information about future possibilities of education in college or university, inclusion of parents in the process of education, so the educational achievements of migrants would be higher.
S. Pong and N. Landale conducted one more research, which was focused on the origin groups of migrant parents in 2012 (Pong & Landale, 2012). The research question was “What is the unique role of post migration circumstances in the outcomes of immigrants and their children?” Thus, they focused on circumstances of migration movement and its influence on children academic success.
As for methodology, authors used least squares regression to analyses the correlation between parents pre-migration education influence educational performance of children. Educational background of parents shows a positive trend to influence children's school grades. The results showed the tendency that both foreign-born and local-born migrant children perform better than natives in many aspects such as health, academic achievements, and emotional performance:
S. Pribesh and D.B. Downey focused their research on studying the correlation between school moves and poor school performance in 1999 (Pribesh & Downey, 1999). NELS (National Education Longitudinal Study) is used for the research. The research is devoted to associations and correlations among migrant trajectories and pupils' school achievements. Authors came to the following results. Students whose parents divorced, or die are not good at Maths. As ex-effect of combined school and residential, the negative effect moves is usually larger than that of school-only or residential-only. Moves lead to a loss in social ties, which in turn affects school performance.
Thus, the prevalent amount of researches were conducted in the USA, China and Europe. The scope of issues expands from educational trajectories to the socio-economic capital of parents and relatives, from external to internal migration. In the next chapter, Russian migration studies will be analyzed.
Empirical findings in Russia
As it was mentioned, there is a lack of children migration studies in Russia. However, foreign social researchers have already analyzed and conducted many surveys to study various phenomena, which are connected to migrant schoolchildren. Russian tradition of studying migrant children is just beginning to develop. It is important to remember that not only Political Science study migrants, but also Sociology, Economics, Mathematics, Geography, and Law.
Generally, most of the scientific works are theoretical, not empirical in Russia. As an example, we can review the work of V.S. Malakhov, “Russia as a New Immigration Country: Policy Response and Public Debate.” The article was written in 2014 (Malakhov, 2014). The research question is “How does the Russian Federation transformed into migration state (Malakhov, 2014).” The author is committed to make a historical analysis of the current situation on migration in Russia after the collapse of the USSR.
One of the main result of this paper is that V.S. Malakhov found the reasons why politicians use migrants. This reason is explained by the dynamic of actions made by the Government after ethnical conflicts in Russia. V.S. Malakhov claims that there is no cooperation among three main forces of any society such as economic sphere, political sphere and non-governmental sphere. The main deference between Russia and European countries on the issue of migration is that there are no trade unions in the Russian Federation. As author stated, nobody can defend migrants rights that is why migrants are exploit by economic and political agents. Malakhov V.S. analyzed not only official, but also “shadowed” situation over migration issue.
Tovar Garcнa E.D. (Tovar Garcнa, 2014), made the valuable research on the theme of schoolchildren. He conducted research, in which he wanted to analyze the correlation between parents' resources and educational achievements of child (Tovar Garcнa, 2014). The research question was “Can the effects of family research explain educational outcomes in Tatarstan?” The hypothesis is “family resources have a positive statistically significant influence on educational achievements”(Tovar Garcнa, 2014). Thus, professor Tovar wanted to understand the determinants of educational outcomes in the Republic of Tatarstan and factors shaping educational outcomes of schoolchildren. He used a data of 2003 pupils interviewed. To analyze the data professor used principle component analysis, least squares with robust standard errors, and probit models. Finally, he got following results. The empirical research shows that family resources strongly determinate educational outcomes, particularly in low-income countries. In Russia, the relevance of these factors, principally, parental education and family income are key explanatory variables is pointed out. Girls have better educational outcomes than boys do, and in general, the best educational achievements belong to pupils speaking Tatar. Schoolchildren, who rarely get sick and whose friends plan to continue their studies, present better educational outcomes.
Among the numerous works of educating children of migrants, scientific research can be distinguished, which was made by the center "Region" held jointly with the Saint Petersburg branch of Higher School of Economics in 2009. The research took place at Saint Petersburg, Krasnodar and Ulyanovsk. The sample consisted of 1,200 people. The purpose of the study was to provide assistance and support for the administration and teachers of schools of the Russian Federation in the diagnosis of the situation with socio-psychological adaptation of children of migrants. Among the factors that have a negative impact on migrant children are xenophobic sentiments in the class (hierarchy relations students) gender differences, anti-school culture, competence in the space of youth enthusiasm (Internet, youth subcultures), club culture, the culture of family ethno-related environment and youth environment.
According to the conclusions, most of the findings made by Western researchers are suitable for our country (Eugenia Lukianova, 2011). Migrant schoolchildren are strongly focused on study. They perform better than locals do. The school environment negatively affects the academic performance of migrant pupils. The most profound effect on academic performance has a history of child migration. The more often one had to move, the worse are the results of one's study. The most ambitious in terms of educational achievement is the second generation of migrants. High school mobility is what distinguishes all the first generation. Migrant children of first generation tend to change school two or three times during the educational process. "One and a half" generation was closer to the recently arrived than the local boys and girls (Mukomel', 2013). Migrants are more disciplined in contrast to the local. The biggest difference between external and internal migrants is in their desire to change school. Thus, we analyzed the main trends of Russian Migration Studies. Five hundred dissertations and synopses were written on the theme of migration in contemporary Russia. Hundreds of dissertations written in the USSR were omitted. The scope of researchers interests extends from Mathematics to Geography. However, there is a shortage of empirical study of children migration in Russia. Only a few surveys were conducted. There is a need for studies like this.
Chapter 2. New empirical evidence for Moscow
2.1 The data and variables
I use the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey data (RLMS-HSE). Higher School of Economics gathered it in cooperation with Demoscope, University of North Caroline and Institute of Sociology. As for current circumstances, we sorted cases related to Moscow. There are 529 cases for Moscow.
The data has been gathering annually since 1992. Moreover, it is still the only monitoring survey of social and economic spheres in Russia. This data is a scope of nationwide representative surveys. The leading world experts built the questionnaires and concept of the research. The main idea of these surveys is to examine the development of the country after reforms. The number of spheres of live covered by the survey consists of income's and expenses' structure, investment environment, employment, welfare, health and nutritional status, migratory behavior and others.
Nevertheless, information about educational outcomes of schoolchildren and their migration status is not a main concern in RLMS-HSE. The survey included a few interesting questions only in the year 2010, consequently this research uses data from year 2010 to 2013. RLMS focuses on such four main sectors of life such as children and adults, households and infrastructure. Children's questionnaire is divided on many sections. These are personal details, migration status, care after children, physical activities, languages, healthcare and others. Thus, the detailed survey was made. Many aspects of life are covered by the research.
Dependent variable
The dependent variable is grades in school or DUMMYGRADE.
The question, which was addressed to parents, is “How would you estimate (his/ her) progress…?” It was asked to understand the academic achievements of children.
The answers are
1. Almost all the grades are five - 01,
2. Basically all the five and the four - 02,
3. Basically all the four - 03,
4. Basically all the four and three - 04,
5. Basically all the three - 05,
6. Basically all the three and often the two - 06,
7. Marks are not given - 96,
8. Doesn't know - 97,
9. Refuses to answer - 98
We modified this variable into dummy condition. If DUMMYGRADE equals one in the cases of, then we got the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd answers, that is, as for good educational achievements of pupils. This means that schoolchildren had only grades from 5 (“almost all the grades are five”) to 4 (“basically all the four”). The dummy variable equals 0, for 4th, 5th and 6th answers, that is, for low educational achievements of students. This means that pupils had grades only from 4 or 3 (“basically all the four and three”) to 2 (“basically all the three and often the two”).
To clarify the variable's values, I will explain some aspects of grading in Russian schools. Pupils' grades vary from 1 to 5. 1 is the lowest mark (poor), which the student can get. Consequently, 5 is for the highest mark (excellent). That is why our choice of grading focuses on 1 and 0. That student who gets 5 and 4 is a good or successful student while the one that gets 3, 2 and 1 is a unsuccessful student.
Independent variables
To understand what determines the educational performance of migrant pupils in Moscow, I will focus on five independent variables. The main idea is examine as the impact of migrant background on academic achievements, controlling for sex, age, socio-economic status, and type of school.
First independent variable is DUMMYMIGRATION. The focus of this variable is to understand whether the person was born in the place where one lives or not. The question of the form is “Was [Name of child] born in another settlement or in the one where he/she is living now?” The first answer is my child was born in another settlement. In this case, the answer equals 1. The answer my child was born in the settlement, where one is living now equals 0. Thus, it became more convenient to analyze through the SPSS. As it is shown (Table #1), the number of non-migrants is much bigger than the one of migrants. There are 476 non-migrants and 53 migrants. As regards to the percentage of, it is 90/10. Total number of cases equals 529.
Second independent variable is MALE. It is important to analyze the difference between children of both genders. I am interested in whether there are differences in migrants' group and group of local among genders. To make it clear, one is for male and zero is for female in present analysis. The number of women representatives is 192 and of man is 208. Total amount of observations is also 529.
Table #2
|
MALE |
||||||
|
Frequency |
Percent |
Valid Percent |
Cumulative Percent |
|||
|
Valid |
0 |
192 |
36,3 |
48,0 |
48,0 |
|
|
1 |
208 |
39,3 |
52,0 |
100,0 |
||
|
Total |
400 |
75,6 |
100,0 |
|||
|
Missing |
System |
129 |
24,4 |
Third independent variable is devoted to AGE. We will try to analyze whether there is a correlation between educational achievements and the age of the pupils. There are schoolchildren from six to fourteen age old in this sample. The biggest number of pupils whose answers were observed is of 8 and 9 years old. There is a small amount of the youngest (6) and the oldest (3) pupils. The overall amount equals 400, when 129 cases were missed.
I use a proxy variable for SES using responses to the question “Does he/she have a personal … (1) Mobile PC, notebook, laptop, netbook, (2) Smartphone, Communicator, i-Phone, (3) Cell phone?” There are five possible responses including 1) Yes, 2) No, 3) Used by several family members, 4) Doesn't know or 5) Refuses to answer. I gave 1 point for each positive answer and 0.5 points for use of the object by other family members. Schoolchildren with higher values on this proxy of SES should have better school grades, as the theory predicts (Tovar-Garcнa 2014). The majority of answers is 1, which means that at least two gadgets are used by family members.
Table #4
|
SES |
||||||
|
Frequency |
Percent |
Valid Percent |
Cumulative Percent |
|||
|
Valid |
,0 |
71 |
13,4 |
13,4 |
13,4 |
|
|
,5 |
7 |
1,3 |
1,3 |
14,7 |
||
|
1,0 |
318 |
60,1 |
60,1 |
74,9 |
||
|
1,5 |
48 |
9,1 |
9,1 |
83,9 |
||
|
2,0 |
68 |
12,9 |
12,9 |
96,8 |
||
|
2,5 |
3 |
,6 |
,6 |
97,4 |
||
|
3,0 |
14 |
2,6 |
2,6 |
100,0 |
||
|
Total |
529 |
100,0 |
100,0 |
The last independent variable is HEALTH. It is an additional variable, which I included to highlight how health conditions influence educational achievements of pupils. This parameter is quite relevant for Russia because migrants and locals have different access to the state health services as it was mentioned in the Chapter 1. Thus, I can raise the issue of health availability to migrants' schoolchildren as a point in development of public policy campaign. In this case, we have one is for very poor, two is for poor, three is for the mean, not a good, but not bad, four is for healthy, and five is for very healthy. According to the Table #5, there are more pupils who had complains on health. These are 368 and 15 cases. From the other hand, the number of people who are healthy is 137 and 5.
Table #5
|
HEALTH |
||||||
|
Frequency |
Percent |
Valid Percent |
Cumulative Percent |
|||
|
Valid |
2 |
5 |
,9 |
1,0 |
1,0 |
|
|
3 |
137 |
25,9 |
26,1 |
27,0 |
||
|
4 |
368 |
69,6 |
70,1 |
97,1 |
||
|
5 |
15 |
2,8 |
2,9 |
100,0 |
||
|
Total |
525 |
99,2 |
100,0 |
|||
|
Missing |
System |
4 |
,8 |
|||
|
Total |
529 |
100,0 |
In addition, I would like to mention the variable REGION. I used it to sort out Moscow from other states of the Russian Federation. RLMS covers almost all the regions of the Russian Federation. That is why I needed to find only cases for Moscow. Finally, I got 529 cases for Moscow.
Table #4
|
Correlations |
||||||||
|
DUMMYGRADE |
DUMMY MIGRATION |
MALE |
SES |
HEALTHORDINAL |
AGE |
|||
|
DUMMY GRADE |
Pearson Cor |
1 |
,001 |
-,216** |
-,061 |
,082 |
-,243** |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,986 |
,000 |
,186 |
,073 |
,000 |
|||
|
N |
478 |
478 |
363 |
478 |
474 |
363 |
||
|
DUMMY MIGRATION |
Pearson Cor |
,001 |
1 |
,098 |
,035 |
,075 |
-,015 |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,986 |
,050 |
,424 |
,085 |
,761 |
|||
|
N |
478 |
529 |
400 |
529 |
525 |
400 |
||
|
MALE |
Pearson Cor |
-,216** |
,098 |
1 |
,025 |
,029 |
,052 |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,000 |
,050 |
,616 |
,562 |
,302 |
|||
|
N |
363 |
400 |
400 |
400 |
396 |
400 |
||
|
SES |
Pearson Cor |
-,061 |
,035 |
,025 |
1 |
,040 |
,295** |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,186 |
,424 |
,616 |
,361 |
,000 |
|||
|
N |
478 |
529 |
400 |
529 |
525 |
400 |
||
|
HEALTH ORDINAL |
Pearson Cor |
,082 |
,075 |
,029 |
,040 |
1 |
-,056 |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,073 |
,085 |
,562 |
,361 |
,263 |
|||
|
N |
474 |
525 |
396 |
525 |
525 |
396 |
||
|
AGE |
Pearson Cor |
-,243** |
-,015 |
,052 |
,295** |
-,056 |
1 |
|
|
Sig. (2-tailed) |
,000 |
,761 |
,302 |
,000 |
,263 |
|||
|
N |
363 |
400 |
400 |
400 |
396 |
400 |
||
|
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed). |
To understand how dependent one variable from another, I built Pearson's correlation matrix. It is clear that all the variables are not strongly dependent one from another.
2.2 Empirical strategy
This section uses logit regression to analyze the relationship among variables. The strategy of present study can be described by the formula:
Overall, the following steps define the strategy. Firstly, I take the RLMS data. Secondly, I sorted out cases for Moscow. Thirdly, I run the binary logistic regression in SPSS to understand the relationship of variables.
2.3 SPSS analysis interpretation
After the running of binary logistic regression, I managed to achieve the following results. There are 529 cases of both migrant and non-migrant children from Moscow. The analysis includes 359 cases because some cases were unclaimed and unconfirmed in accordance with the SPSS logistic regression.
It can be explained by the fact that I use five independent variables and a dependent variable. Some people deny answering all the questions in questionnaire. Some people consider that points about migration status or SES are inappropriate. My point is that these questions confused people because of cultural features. It is not common to claim that this information is private. Overall, this means that if there is missing value for any variable in the model, the entire case will be excluded from the analysis. The 32,1% percent was missed. Consequently, 170 cases were not appropriate.
Table #2
|
Case Processing Summary |
||||
|
Unweighted Casesa |
N |
Percent |
||
|
Selected Cases |
Included in Analysis |
359 |
67,9 |
|
|
Missing Cases |
170 |
32,1 |
||
|
Total |
529 |
100,0 |
||
|
Unselected Cases |
0 |
,0 |
||
|
Total |
529 |
100,0 |
||
|
a. If weight is in effect, see classification table for the total number of cases. |
Table #3
|
Variables in the Equation |
||||||||
|
B |
S.E. |
Wald |
Df |
Sig. |
Exp(B) |
|||
|
Step 1a |
DUMMYMIGRATION |
-,131 |
,396 |
,110 |
1 |
,740 |
,877 |
|
|
SES |
,052 |
,211 |
,061 |
1 |
,804 |
1,054 |
||
|
HEALTHORDINAL |
,260 |
,226 |
1,324 |
1 |
,250 |
1,297 |
||
|
AGE |
-,310 |
,071 |
19,267 |
1 |
,000 |
,733 |
||
|
MALE |
-1,065 |
,265 |
16,189 |
1 |
,000 |
,345 |
||
|
Constant |
3,856 |
1,104 |
12,207 |
1 |
,000 |
47,285 |
||
|
a. Variable(s) entered on step 1: dummymigration, SES, healthordinal, Age, Male. |
Table 3 focuses on the results of the research. As it is possible to analyze from the Colomn 1, DUMMYMIGRATION shows that migration status does not affect educational achievements of students. Consequently, DUMMYMIGRATION equals 0,74, which means that the indicator is statistically insignificant. Thus, if you are a migrant, it does not mean that you have more chances to become a good student.
As for the SES (socio-economic status), p-value equals 0,8, we cannot reject the Ho that the value of the coefficient is 0. It means that socio-economic status of parents does not influence school achievements of pupils. Generally, the proxy for SES suggest negative probability of being classified as an unsuccessful student. It means the richer you are the higher probability you have better educational results. The same situation is with the variable on health issues. P-value for HEALTH is 0,250. Consequently, grades in school do not depend on how healthy a pupil is.
Next parameter is the AGE variable. The corresponding odds ratio indicates, that when a schoolchild gets older by 1 year, the probability of being classified as successful student will decrease by 27%. Consequently, the coefficient for AGE is negative, this means that the probability to be a good students is lower as older is the schoolchild.
As for the MALE variable, p-value is low, gender influences educational performance of pupils. As the value of the "B" of the MALE variable is less than 0, and the exponent (exp) is less than 1, then the male gender reduces the odds ratio of 0.345 in time (this is the value of exp B. The corresponding odds ratio indicates that if a schoolchild is a man, then the probability of being classified as successful student will decrease by 65%. Thus, there is an interesting trend. Boys have lower probabilities to be good students in comparison with girls.
Overall, the main result is that migrants do not study better than their local classmates in Moscow schools do.
Chapter 3. Analysis of public policies for migrant schoolchildren in Moscow and California
One of the major goals of the master thesis is a comparative analysis of public policies between Russia and the USA, in particular between Moscow and its oblast and California. The question is “Which policy, program, techniques can Russia borrow from the USA?” The focus is devoted to the examination legal acts, public policies, researches about migrant schoolchildren in California. What is migration and who is migrant?
3.1 US as a country of migrants and for migrants
Originally, the US is a country of immigrants. From the historical prospective, it was a colonial British country with a large number of various diaspora such as German, Irish, Spanish, Portuguese, and others. Large migration flows formed this country.
The US was built as a nation of immigrants. Intensive migration of the Catholic Mediterranean countries and Ireland began from the middle of the XIX century as a result of potato famine. It was the first reason to cause fear and uncertainty of change in religious and ethnic balance and the requirements to introduce immigration quotas. However, it was just the beginning of the migration rush to the US and, particularly, to the southern states such as California and Texas(Mosier, 2001). The concerns of tightening regulation over migration flows were intensified when the immigrants began to arrive from Asians and representatives of non-Christian faiths. In particular, in the second half of the nineteenth century there was intensive immigration of contract workers from China and some other Asian countries (Hernad, 2012; Lai et al., 2014a; Wong & Takai, 1990;Liu, 2013;Min, 2011).
At the end of the XIX century, there were significant migration flows from Central and Eastern Europe (including large-scale Jewish immigration). The scale of immigration continued to grow. The famous New York's Ellis Island ("immigration gates") passed through more than 12 million people (Diorio, 2007).
USA is the country with the biggest amount of international migrants in the world. According to the census of 2013, the number of migrants lived in the US was more than 40 million. Russia is on the second place. Thus, USA is the most attractive destination for immigrants nowadays, attracting about 20% worldwide migrants (“Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States”, n.d.). The ratio of migrants and locals is 13% to 63% as the overall population of the US is 316 million residents. Moreover, as my research is focused on migrant children, the number of migrants and their children is about 80 million people, which means that it is about 25% of the US population (Metro Area-to-Metro Area Migration Flows: 2009-2013 ACS, (n.d.).
The United States remains the only developed country in the world where the population continues to grow up. According to the last trend, the US population increases by about 2 million due to natural increase and by 1 million as a result of legal immigration. In addition, there is no statistics over the illegal migration (Muste, 2013).
According to the Figure 1, migration flows reached its peak in the end of the XIX and first decennary of the XX century. About nine million migrants came to the US during this period. The total share of migrant's relatively local residents was at a maximum level over fifteen percent in 1910. Nowadays, the ratio of migrants to local 13.7 percent. It is the second largest maximum in the US history (Meissner, Meyers, Abraham, Hamilton, & Fix, 2006). After the outstanding growth in the rise of the immigrants, there was a decline in the migration flows to the US. However, the immigration rose when the Second World War ended. There was a significant growth from the 1970th until nowadays. The largest growth of the migrant flows was from the 1990s to 2010th. The number of migrants increased on the fifteen million (Ulletin & Ford, 2007; Homeland Security Office of Immigration Statistics, 2013).
Figure 7. Number of Immigrants and Their Share of the Total U.S. Population, 1850-2014. Eric B. Jensen, Anthony Knapp, C. Peter Borsella, and Kathleen Nestor, Population Division, U.S. Census Bureau. Source:
Why the USA is still an attractive country for migrants? There are several reasons for that. First of all, the existence of social networks that contribute to migration, lack of jobs at home of immigrants, the need of the US economy in cheap labor (Nirmala Kannankutty and Joan Burrelli, 2007). In addition, immigration, primarily Mexican, is the result of the policy of economic expansion implemented by the United States. As a result of the expansion in the spheres of trade, liberalization, and legislation, Mexico and neighboring states (Texas, California, and others) became much closer. Expansion of US economic presence meant that millions of Mexicans who were involved in the economic restructuring, wanted to move to the USA.
Finally, the system of immigrant adaptation and integration developed in the US under the peculiar conditions mentioned above can be analyzed as the most operative one. In accordance with historical circumstances and procedural innovations, the US can be taken as an example.
California as a paradise for migrants
The population of California increased dramatically from a hundred thousand to one million and a half in a period 1850 - 1900. However, an upward trend continued until the end of the XX century when the population of California rose to thirty five million people (Olmstead & Rhode, 2000; Johnson, 1996).
According to the statistics presented by Migration Policy Institute (Figure 8), California is the most attractive state for migrants. Immigrant share was about 27% of citizens (38 803 000) in 2014. California is in top-5 state in the US based on the latest statistics. These are California, New York and Texas, Florida, and New Jersey.
Figure 8. Immigrant Population and Share of Total Population. Source:
The largest share of migrants in California are Mexicans. 37% of all the Mexican population of the USA is settled in California. Overall, there i 53% of migrants from Latin America and 37% from Asia. Migrants come to California from different countries. These are Mexicans (4 million), Philippines, and China (over 1 million each). However, recent trend showed that California is becoming more popular among Asians especially Chinese. As there are 53% of Chinese migrants who arrived to California in 2007-2011 (“Immigrants in California”, n.d.).
More than four million migrant children under 18 lived in California in accordance with the Migration Policy Institute report of 2013 (“Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States”, n.d.). It is the almost half of children living in the state.
From the other hand, there is an unfavorable statistics related to the legal aspects of the issue. California is in top-5 states with the highest number of unauthorized migrants. 11.4 million illegal migrants (almost 30% nationally) live in the state (See Figure 9).
Figure 9. The share of migrants. Source
California attracted migrants from all over the world for a several reasons. Firstly, California locates in the most productive and profitable part of the US. California is on the shore of the Pacific Ocean and its earth is profitable for farming. In fact, majority of farmers are migrant from Latin America predominantly Mexicans (Aguirre International, 2005). Among all the fifty US states, California occupies a leading place in the number of national parks and reserves. Wealth of California based on the diversity of natural resources of the state, gorgeous climate and numerous local community population.
Secondly, California is popular among migrants for economic reason. The GDP of California is almost on the same level with such developing states as Texas and New York (See Table 1). Historically, large migration flows from China to Ireland flooded California in pursuit of gold during the Gold Rush. A gold rush transformed California from distant, remote and little-known region in one of the richest states in the US It laid down the foundations for its future prosperity. During the period of the gold rush in California, it was produced more than one hundred and twenty five million ounces of gold. People from all the regions of the world sought for easy money (Rohe, 2010).
California is still one of the most developed states in the US. However, the trend that has been lasting since 2010 showed that the amount of migrants is decreasing. It took place because of the economic crises of 2008. The amount of working place is decreasing (Charlton, Taylor, Fuller, & Alston, 2013). Another reason is that Mexico is developing nowadays, there is less, and less reasons to immigrate. The salaries rise and the issue of unemployment is passing (Rosenblum, Kandel, Seelke, & Wasem, 2012). In addition, legal constraints on immigrants became more and more strict during the presidency of B. Obama (Simanski & Sapp, 2013).
Overall, the issue of migrant schoolchildren for California is relevant and actual. California can be used as an example of migrant flows' regulation for Russia and in particularly Moscow as it has eventful history. Moscow is also one of the most attractive city for migrants in Russia and in the whole world. There are almost four million migrant schoolchildren under age of 18 in California, which equals to 50% of overall amount of pupils in California. The situation in Moscow is not dramatic, but in accordance with various sources there are from forty thousands to eighty thousands migrant pupils in Moscow. However, as it was mentioned, the situation changes and experience, which California has can be helpful for the capital of Russia.
3.2 Analysis of legislation to migrant schoolchildren in Russia and USA
Before holding the analysis, I would like to highlight the reason, why I decided to focus on the comparison of USA and Russia. From the one hand, these states are incomparable in a matter of migrant issues. The USA has much longer history of regulating migrant flows. The number of migrants are different. The composition of immigrant flows is different.
However, from the other hand, the USA and the Russian Federation are much closer than it seems at first sight. Firstly, Russia is the second country in an overall share of migrants among the population in accordance with the UN report (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs/Population Division, 2013), while the USA is on the first place. Consequently, the only country Russia can take an example of is the United States of America. Secondly, the USA is in the top 10 countries of the world with one of the best practices over immigrant integration. The USA is on the ninth place among over 90 countries participating in the research. Thirdly, both examples of Moscow and California are unique to consider because both Russia and the USA has federal structure. Moscow and California are similar in terms of amount of migrants, variety of migrants and regulation uniqueness. Both states are one of the most popular places among migrants in the countries. Both states has a variety of internal and external immigrants. Both states has their own paths in regulating migration flows with the difference to other states of the countries due to the federal status.
Migrants contributes to the labour market development, public purse, and economic growth in accordance with the OECD report. Over 50% of the labour growth in the US and 70% in Europe are migrants. Migrants are unique labour force as they filled all the sectors of the modern economy. Migrants contribute to the flexibility of the economy as they can work in different niches. In addition, migration increases public purse. Firstly, migrants pay taxes and make social input. Migration is the inflow of the working force, the human capital development. Migration leads to the increase in taxes (OECD, 2014).
The research of James Gillula, managing director of HIS, over the Hispanic migrants' impact on the US economy concludes the positive effect (Gillula, 2015). As the author claims, migrants will play a significant role in the growth of the economy of the US. It can be explained by the fact that Hispanics are the youngest and the most flexible segment.
Large migration flows need to be regulated. The state is interested in qualitative migration as it guarantees economic growth (Hanson, 2012; Wadhwa, Saxenian, Rissing, & Gereffi, 2008).
The aim of the present part is to highlight the legislation, which is devoted to the regulation of the migrant schoolchildren in Russia and the US. The conclusion of the present part is the comparative analysis of the legislation, the advantages and disadvantages of both systems.
The status of immigrant and citizen in Russia
Despite the growing interest in migration, there is still no uniform approach to the formulation of this concept. There are about 40 definitions of migration in the Russian literature. However, as I focus on legislation the focus will be given to legal norms. I would use the average definition. Migration is the flow of people into other territories inside or outside the country.
International treaties determine the legal status of foreign citizens in the Russian Federation. In particular, the covenants and conventions ratified or otherwise accepted in the Russian Federation, as well as bilateral and multilateral international agreements. In addition, the status of foreign citizens in the Russian Federation is determined by national legislation.
In relation to the constitutional and legal status of foreign citizens, it can be said that the principles of such status is enshrined in the Constitution. Anchoring the principles of personal status, including the status of foreigners, at the highest level (in the norms of the Constitution, constitutional acts) allows to talk about the nature of its constituent.
According to part three of article 62 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, foreign citizens and stateless persons shall have the rights and bear the same obligations as citizens of the Russian Federation, except cases required by federal laws or international treaties of the Russian Federation.
The following federal laws regulate legal status of foreigners in Russia:
§ Federal Law of 31.05.2002 number 62-FZ "On Citizenship of the Russian Federation" is amended on 12.11.2012. This normative legal act determines the procedures, conditions and grounds for obtaining Russian citizenship. Moreover, it gives definitions to the key concepts such as citizenship, dual citizenship, foreign citizen, stateless person, etc.
§ Federal Law of 25.07.2002 number 115-FZ "On the Legal Status of Foreign Citizens in the Russian Federation" (as amended on 12.11.2012). Article 1 of the law defines the legal status of foreign citizens in the Russian Federation, as well as regulates relations between foreign citizens.
The status of immigrant and citizen in the US
US immigration policy emerged after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Its goals, objectives and methods were changing in accordance with the interests of the economic system, the US foreign policy position and attitudes towards immigrants in American society for more than two hundred years.
US immigration attraction remains on a high level. The US Constitution does not provide any restrictions to immigration. The first laws governing the status of foreigners on its territory already appeared in the early 19th century. They were imperfect and were rotated in the direction of tightening, concerning both illegal and legal migrants.
Under US immigration law, any person who is not a US citizen, is considered a foreigner. Depending on their legal status, foreigners are divided into three categories:
§ Persons who are allowed temporary stay in the United States (non-immigrants);
§ US permanent residents (legal immigrants);
§ Illegal aliens (illegal immigrants).
The main difference between migrants and non-migrants is the character received their permission to stay in the United States. Nonimmigrant receive permission for temporary and immigrants - a permanent residence in the United States. Nature of authorization corresponds to the declared intention of staying in the US either temporarily or permanently (Jones-Correa, 2012). Category intent is one of the core in the immigration law and in solving practical issues authorization to enter the consular service of the State Department and the admission to the country at the border crossing and extending the length of stay in the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). Anyone who is outside and wants to enter the United States a person must receive appropriate his (non-immigrant or immigrant) intention type of visa (Kandel, 2014).
Having explained all the legal features of both Russia and the USA in explaining the status of immigrant, I focus on the research framework of the study. Next part is devoted to the analysis of operating practices in California and Moscow devoted to the educational immigrant environment.
3.3 MIPEX as a research framework for the study
The main idea of the research is to compare the situation over migrant schoolchildren in Moscow and California to understand, which practices can be exchanged over the states.
To reach the goal of the study we will focus on the methodology of Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX). However, it is important to describe in a few words what MIPEX is and how its methodology can be relevant for my study.
MIPEX is an instrument, which aims to analyze policies of migrant integration almost all over the world. There are such countries as Canada, the US, New Zealand, all members of the EU, and others. The index is based on 167 indicators that developed to examine migrants' opportunities and how migrants are engaged into society. Originally, the indicators were designed to make it useful to compare different practices of countries included in the research. The comparisons play the major role in the MIPEX as it gives possibilities to examine policies to understand which of them operate more effectively.
Moreover, the index was developed with assistance of the leading scholars, institutions, and policy-makers. As it was mentioned, the index consists of 167 indicators. Each indicator concerns to a specific policy area. The policies refer to labour market mobility, family reunion, health education, political participation, permanent residence, anti-discrimination, and access to nationality. There are three options for each questions. The highest mark is three points that means that the policy matches to the best standards in conditions of equal treatment. The main idea over the standards is that migrants have to be treated as equal. They have to have equal opportunities with locals in accordance with the principles of the EU (Council of the European Union, 2013).
Each of the eight policies consist of four dimensions, which analyses four aspects of policy. As I focus on educational policy in my research, the dimensions for it include access, targeting needs, new opportunities, intercultural education for all. For instance, the dimension access consists of the follow indicators. These are access to preliminary, compulsory, non-compulsory and higher education, legal constraints from having the right to study, assessment of education, free language trainings.
The project MIREX is developing by Barcelona Central for International Affairs and Migration Policy Group. These are key NGOs, which aims to promote principles of equal environments and globallness for all. In addition, the project was designed and supported by the international agents such as European Commission and International Organization for Migration. Important role in the project was dedicated to local institutions and independent researches, which hold research in the countries. For instance, these are Boston College School of Social Work's (US), Association de Soutien aux Travailleurs Immigrйs (Luxembourg), ICCR (Hungary), and others.
My interest in the MIRPEX is caused with the aim of the research. There is no MIPEX research for the Russian Federation. As I am interested in the educational policy of migrant schoolchildren in Russia, I use the research framework of the education policy, four dimensions and indicators. As soon as I analyze the data, I can compare the results of Moscow and California.
Unfortunately, the theme of migrant schoolchildren is not developed in Russia. According to this fact, my analysis is based more on legal acts and state strategies. However, present paper is also based on the current researches of professor D. Alexandrov (D. A. Alexandrov, Ivaniushina, & Kazartseva, 2015b; D. Alexandrov, Baranova, & Ivaniushina, 2012b), E. Lukyinova (Evgeniya Lukianova, 2011), Y. Florinskaya (Florinskaya, 2010; Zayonchkovskaya, Florinskaya, Poletaev, & Doronina, 2014b), etc. I got acquainted with many experts listed above during the internships, study process and conferences in Moscow and Saint Petersburg.
Access dimension
The main issue of this measurement is devoted to the availability of education for migrant schoolchildren. It is important to answer whether local and migrant schoolchildren have the same opportunities and access to preliminary, compulsory, non-compulsory, and higher education. In addition, the issue of access is also connected with the legal status of migrants. Consequently, there is a question of how legal status influences opportunities of migrants to study in Russia. migrant intercultural state education
Indicator: access to pre-primary education and compulsory education. According to the Russian educational system, basic general (first - fourth classes) and secondary education (fifth - eleventh classes) are compulsory. In this case, pre-primary or initial education is compulsory in Russia (Mipex, 2010). Moreover, it is obligatory to complete the initial common program and basic general education for the development of secondary education program (Klyatchko, 2013). The requirement of compulsory secondary education remains valid until the age of 18 years, but the requirement of initial common program and basic general education has no time constraints. Admission to the school is carried out in the presence of the following documents: birth certificate, health card is a standard form or a copy of a medical card, passport of any parent and registration. As regards the latter, school admissions take citizens with a 3-month registration (Poletaev, 2011). Consequently, if migrant parents are careful with documents, children will not have any constraints about getting pre-primary compulsory education for children. All the basic general and secondary compulsory education is available for migrants on the equal basis subject to the rule of law.
Legally, all the people on the territory of Russia have the right for education subject to legislation. However, present indicator aims to assess what measures there are to help migrants. First parameter is state support for migrants to increase participation (financial support, campaigns and other means). Government does pay attention to the legal and formal aspects, but they do not pay attention to the support and functional changes of the system (Klyatchko, 2013)(Zayonchkovskaya et al., 2014b). There is still no financial or supportive programs for migrant schoolchildren in the educational sphere. There are local programs and campaigns for cultural adaptation, but the sphere of education is not supported. For instance, there are initiatives of Moscow Museum (“School of migrant languages”, n.d.). The Government adheres to the status quo in the issue.
Second parameter is the targeted state measures to assist migrant schoolchildren to successfully complete educational program (early school leaving, second chance programs etc.). There are a few measures, which provides qualitative assistance to migrant schoolchildren to help them complete the school. Firstly, there are special courses for children of immigrants to study the Russian language. These courses are implemented on various levels of educational institutions such as schools, universities, special social schools (Esina, Z, Kutuzova, G, Nahabina, M, Soboleva, N, Suchkova, 2001). Secondly, the law “on Education in the Russian Federation” guarantees special rights to migrant schoolchildren. Migrants have the rights to pass Russian exams in less stringent conditions (See “indicator: compulsory education as legal right”). Thirdly, migrant schoolchildren have an extra chance to retake the exam in case of failure.
Language learning is the main instruments for migrant schoolchildren to assimilate and integrate to the Russian-speaking environment. There is a project of Moscow non-governmental organization, which aims to solve this issue. Special courses are organized on the basis of Moscow schools. They have an ethno-cultural direction. The targeted group for the courses are migrants with different level of the Russian language knowledge. The project is named “Schools of Russian language”. It is a kind of preliminary one-year education before the compulsory education. Nowadays, there are about thirteen schools that operate in Moscow. The main problem for the project is that the Government of Moscow does not support this project. It works on a volunteer basis.
Overall, the indicator “access to pre-primary education and compulsory education” can be assessed as option two (score 50). There is compliance with the only parameter in sample. There are special measures that help migrants to successfully complete educational course. However, there is a lack of special measures for migrant schoolchildren to increase participation.
Indicator: compulsory education as a legal right. In accordance with paragraph 3 Article 62 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, “foreign citizens and persons without citizenship are endowed with rights and responsibilities on the same basis with Russian citizens in the Russian Federation. All the citizens are enrolled in educational institutions by residing in the territory. Migrants, refugees and locals have the right to receive an education on the appropriate level”. The municipal education authorities have to take control of all the children of refugees and internally displaced persons on its territory and provide them with training in educational institutions.
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